Monthly Archives: October 2010

(Please right click on the link below to open the suggested background music to this evening’s treatise in a new browser window. A marketing treatise on branding and a close examination of why I dress this way just to keep them at bay. Mostly because Halloween is every day.)

In my Masters in Science program at University of San Diego, I had the good fortune of having a visiting professor, Tom Buckles, for a marketing strategy course. Tom is one of those ridiculously brilliant people that you choose to stay after an evening class with, just passing the time speaking about nothing. Tom’s wife was finishing a doctorate in theology and was studying most evenings. Tom and I would sit in his office after class and discuss the most interesting topics….Tom opining on weighty matters and me sitting there slack jawed and drooling.

Tom drilled into our heads that a brand is all about trust. When you have a customer experience with Apple, Starbucks, McDonalds, or Nike anywhere in the world, odds are that this customer experience will be the same regardless of whether you are in Spokane, WA or Bhopal, India. You can trust that your expectations as a consumer of that good or service will be met, simply by seeing the name on the sign or the logo.

Branding is all about trust.

If you are visual and would like to see a picture of Tom, please click on this link to his current university: Biola University, otherwise known as the Bible Institute of Southern California. The rest of us will wait right here.

When the Ed Hardy phase of utterly awful and ridiculous clothing hit, did you blame Ed Hardy? Me too. Ed was not to blame because Ed was simply a legendary tattoo artist who chose to license his work to Christian Audigier. Mr. Audigier is to blame for the tool bags you and I saw running around in silly tight tee shirts.

What was the Ed Hardy brand? What could you trust when you met an individual wearing Mr. Audigier’s Ed Hardy clothing? First, you could trust that this individual clearly did not have mirrors in their home or that they were blind. Second, you could trust that intelligent conversation with this Ed Hardy wearing person is as likely as my beloved Cleveland Browns playing in the Super Bowl this year. Third, you can trust that anyone who clothes (or has clothed) themselves in Ed Hardy clothing is a tool bag. Finally, you can trust that the Ed Hardy person would follow hundreds of lemmings off of a cliff because there is no way they chose that clothing because it looked good when they walked out of the dressing room. Just because it is in fashion does not mean it looks good.

Branding is all about trust. When you see the Ed Hardy silliness, you know exactly what to expect from the person wearing it. That is the embodiment of trust.

Halloween is upon us. I just purchased the outfit detailed below for thirty-seven cents on E-Bay. If you see the following outfit at your door on October 31, please give me as many Razzles and Reese’s Cups as you can find.

Am going to start with these jeans:

Then I am going to put on this skin tight tank top

Am going to cover the tank top with this tee shirt

Then I will put on these gloves:

……and then cover the tee shirt with this jacket.

You will see this jacket tied around my waist. In case it snows in The LJ.

I will have this in my left hand, although I have no idea what it is. It is very sparkly and it is an Ed Hardy thing. Thus, it will make me quite popular!

If you need a light for your cigarette, please ask me to light it because I will have this in my right hand:

If we meet and “click”, perhaps you will come back to Chez Mully for some rye toast and coffee. Should this be your fortune, you will see this computer in my office:

To pull the entire outfit together, I will wear these shoes, of course:

Halloween is all about candy.

Colt McCoy is the starting quarterback for my beloved Cleveland Browns this weekend in a game that has now become the embodiment of good versus evil. Colt McCoy, a solid Christian with a thin face versus a rapist with a Baldwinesque face. Ben Roethlisberger is the lost Baldwin brother and has, at age twenty-eight, a face and head larger than a Prius. It is a wonder they can find a helmet as large as a Prius.

Pop Big Ben quiz. What is the Roethlisberger brand these days? You can trust that Ben’s face/head will soon be larger than a station wagon; most likely by Thanksgiving day. You can trust that Ben will throw twenty-two touchdowns this year and only fourteen interceptions. You can trust than Ben will always be a misogynist and an unconvicted rapist. Moreover, you can trust that when I watch the angelic Colt McCoy win against the rapist Ben Roethlisberger the words from the police report below will loop through my mind. And this is a separate incident from the other rape.

“Ten days after a 20-year-old sorority sister reported being raped by Roethlisberger, 28, in the bathroom of a Milledgeville nightclub, the GBI learned of the alleged prior encounters from a member of the Milledgeville Police Department’s Youth Explorer Program. The source, Linc Boyer, apparently passed on information provided to him by a sibling of the woman involved in the previous incidents.

As detailed in the below GBI report, the woman “is 21 or 22 years old” and worked at the Great Waters golf course, which is near Roethlisberger’s retreat on Lake Oconee. On one occasion, the woman, acting as a designated driver, drove Roethlisberger home from a party. After helping the inebriated athlete to his bedroom, Roethlisberger allegedly would not let her leave. The woman “was able to get to the front door of the house, but Roethlisberger slammed the door.” He then allegedly pulled down his pants and told the woman “she could do whatever she wants.”

A week after the incident (the date of which is not specified in GBI documents), Roethlisberger invited the woman to a party at his home. While there, she “ended up in Roethlisberger’s bedroom,” where the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback reportedly wanted to show her a new bed. After asking her to lie down, Roethlisberger “was allegedly forceful” with the woman and “put his hand up [her] skirt.” After pushing Roethlisberger’s hand away, the woman went to leave the home, which angered the football star. The woman then ‘went home and told her father, but her father chose not to pursue the issue’.”

Happy Halloween (in advance), you naughty (fill in the blank)

The link below will take you to a short, four page article on how our brain models brands, as well as an excellent little bibliography.

(Please right click on the link below to open the suggested background music for this evening’s poetry and geography discussion in a new browser window. A pretty little ditty from the lead singer of Echo and the Bunny Men and the perfect background music for a little Bobbie Browning poetry reading)

Five states (ten percent of the country) allow same sex marriage as of this evening. A tip of the hat to the following states:

Connecticut

Vermont

Iowa

New Hampshire

Massachusetts

And a Bobbie Browning poem for those of you coming out tomorrow so that you can share your love in public. Bravo to you and enjoy your day. There are millions of us, straight and gay lined up in support behind you. We got your back.

Life in a Love: Robert Browning

Escape me?
Never
Beloved!
While I am I, and you are you,
So long as the world contains us both,
Me the loving and you the loth,
While the one eludes, must the other pursue.
My life is a fault at last, I fear:
It seems too much like a fate, indeed!
Though I do my best I shall scarce succeed.
But what if I fail of my purpose here?
It is but to keep the nerves at strain,
To dry one’s eyes and laugh at a fall,
And baffled, get up to begin again,
So the chase takes up one’s life, that’s all.
While, look but once from your farthest bound,
At me so deep in the dust and dark,
No sooner the old hope drops to ground
Than a new one, straight to the selfsame mark,
I shape me
Ever
Removed!

Mind of Mully recognizes all marital unions of those in love. Woman-Man, Man-Man, Woman-Woman, and Elephant-Elephant. Love is love.

(Please right click the link below to open the suggested background music for this evening’s treatise in a new browser window. “Crank the music up”. Bass riff. “Bring that stuff in” Lead riff. “The movement’s in motion with massive militant poetry.” “Now check this out”.)

Hello. How are you? Good. Me? Fine, thanks. (twelve seconds of awkward, first date silence) That was a heck of a fine campaign week. We have three weeks remaining to get to know each other before you elect me Emperor of Florida so let’s take full advantage of our time together. Plenty of celebrities have met and married in less than thirty days: there is no reason we cannot have the same sort of mercurial courtship and betrothal.

Where did we leave off the other day? Believe it was me talking about me. That’s a fine place to start this evening. Cannot think of a livelier or more entertaining topic because I am nothing if not self absorbed. There are several bored billionaires in various political races across these great United States. Bored billionaires who no longer enjoy hanging out with their spouses and realize that it is a poor idea to leave their hundreds of millions to their trust fund children. Billionaire candidates spending hundreds of millions to get on Wikipedia a few years from now with the first Wiki paragraph reading “one of the poorest legislators the United States has ever seen (insert billionare name here) spent $523M of their own money on their campaign yet only served one term.”

My Republican opponent here for Emperor of Florida, Rick Scott, would have been one of those Wikipedia entries had I not chosen to enter the bloody fray. You may ask what the primary difference is between a billionaire like Mr. Scott and me. The primary difference is that Mr. Scott has a billion dollars and I landed the other day in Orlando with three dollars and seventy-eight cents in my pocket. And a half a pack of gum.

Time travel is a central campaign theme for all of us, as it should be. As completely off the wall, out of touch and nut jobesque as eye doctor and Kentucky Republican candidate Rand Paul is, he has yet to recognize the criticality of time travel to this election. Outside of Christine O’Donnell, who clearly did not graduate from any of the forty-three schools she has listed on various Curriculum Vitaes, no other candidate has made time travel a central campaign theme. This is surprising because as I watch the “debates” and view the commericals this mid-term election season, one thing is certain. If all these nut job, “I’m not a career politician” type folks get elected by the slack jawed electorate, Congress is going to resemble Nurse Ratched’s ward from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.

For my Florida campaign, jobs are first. Time travel is second.

As promised in my Wednesday evening Pensacola speech, Steven Hawking and Michio Kaku joined the Mind of Mully election team as time travel advisors over the weekend. Ashoke Sen and his box of tachyons remain firmly entrenched in the Rick Scott camp and, quite frankly, we didn’t want him on the Mully campaign anyway. Mr. Sen has really, really bad eyeglass frames and seldom shaves. Our campaign is a six miles wide and three inches deep. Thus, Mr. Sen does not get to be on our time travel advisory board.

Many political campaigns are afraid to have theoretical physicists on their campaign team. I have no fear. Moreover, after watching voters actually lean towards mentally infirm candidates such as Sharon Angle in Nevada and Carl Paladino in New York, it is clear that the electorate is drawn towards “odd” this year as strongly as Christine O’Donnell is drawn towards Wiccan altars.

Upon entering the Florida Emperor race eleven day ago, I promised all of you a positivistic campaign. A campaign full of fake words and dripping with happiness. Several periodicals reported yesterday that 62% of the campaign ads over the past seven days have been negative campaign ads. You Floridites have seen these negative campaign with batsh*t crazy (and remarkably chubby for his age) Democratic candidate Alan Grayson here in our peninsulistic state of Florida. Mr. Grayson’s ads are not only negative, they are also silly and void of facts. How much do you love www.factcheck.org in this election season?

In response to these nasty campaign ads, my partner in crime Stevie JC sketched out the new campaign poster you see below. When you show up by the millions at future campaign rallies, please wear either bunny ears or colorful boas. No one can be unhappy or hateful while wearing bunny ears or a colorful boa. There will also be jelly beans and fizzy drinks with little umbrellas at all future Mully campaign rallies because no one can be unhappy or hateful while chewing jelly beans or toasting my economic job creating policies with fizzy, umbrella decorated drinks.

Jeff Tweedy from the band Wilco joined the Mind of Mully campaign as musical advisor for the next three weeks, although Jeff has virtually no input on time travel. Was actually just bragging a little bit there because Jeff Tweedy is ridiculously talented and when I win, we will have Wilco play Via Chicago at the inaugural weenie roast. Via Chicago is a great song. Let’s get back to the central campaign theme: time travel.

Were Albert Einstein and Kurt Godel not dead, they would also be on the Mind of Mully Florida Campaign time travel committee. Mr. Godel postulated on Mr. Einstein’s equations of general relativity that the universe rotated….which means that if you had a fast enough vehicles you could fly around the universe and arrive back here on earth before you left. These are the “closed time-like curves” that led to mathematicians and physicists postulating wormholes and time travel through collapsed black holes.

Just as India made itself a hotbed of software coding years ago, under my four to twelve year reign Florida will become the coolest place for String Field Theory development and time travel technology advancement. Mr. Kaku has done a spiffy job of advancing quantum physics and Einsteinian physics to a point where we Floridites will be able to build our own stable wormholes by 2016. Once we nail down the Gauge Invariant Reactions, we will all be rolling around through time like dogs rolling around in dead kelp on the beach.

Jobs. In addition to the email fraud our elderly Floridites will perpetrate daily when I am elected(https://mindofmullybizhausshoppe.wordpress.com/2010/09/22/visigoths-villains-the-pensacolan-svengali/ ), the Mind of Mully crack election team has a 2011 to 2021 plan that will rival the Tennessee Valley Authority plan in its boldness. Beginning next January, unemployed Florida residents will begin digging a one hundred and forty-three mile canal connecting South Beach in Miami to Fort Myers. Our public works canal will allow tourists choosing the west coast of Florida to rent jet skis and share their tourist dollars with the clubs on Ocean Drive in SoBe. Miami tourists weary of art deco by day three can take a canal jet ski from Miami to Captiva Island to watch the sun set. Tourist socialism: a redistribution of the tourist wealth. Eat your heart out, FDR and Harold Ickes.

Oh, and we will also have bake sales every Saturday morning on our northern borders where Floridians will sell baked goods to Alabama and Georgia.

This would an opportune time to disclose that I am absolutely positive that I have employed non-US citizens for work. As you may have read in the papers, Meg Whitman, California gubernatorial candidate lied like a rug about her non-US citizen housekeeper. Know why? Because she is a billionaire. Mr. Rick Scott is also a billionaire, although I cannot say with certainty if Mr. Scott still lies like he did when he was CEO of Columbia HCA and they were perpetrating the largest Medicare fraud in U.S. history. Billionaires lie. As mentioned earlier, I have three dollars and seventy-eight cents. The gum is all gone. That said, here is a private message for the Spanish speaking portion of the Floridite electorate. Xenophobes, feel free to skip ahead to the next English paragraph.

Some ask what I will do as Emperor of Florida when we figure out time travel. My opponents for Emperor of Florida, Mr. Scott and Ms. Sink, may lead you to believe that I may use time travel to reverse the 1997 Cleveland Indians loss to the team Florida purchased for a single year to rob my beloved Indians of their rightful 1997 World Series victory. This is patently untrue. As a state, we would only use time travel for good, just as Marty McFly did. First order of business would be to head back to Dade County, Florida circa Q1, 1977 to make a significant change with Anita Bryant.

Back in 1977, Ms. Bryant used her singing “success” as a national platform to campaign for the repeal of local anti-discrimination ordinances in Florida. As a child, I disliked her music; however, her orange juice commercials were mildly entertaining. Though it was years ago, many of us have clear memories of Ms. Bryant’s hatred of homosexuality. It’s quite possible that the root cause analysis of much of this far right homosexual hate surfacing lately originated with Ms. Bryant back in 1977.

My first trip as Emperor of Florida will be back to January 17, 1977 where I will surgically staple Ms. Bryant’s mouth shut and then coat it will some glue, leaving a small hole on the left side for a straw. I will then travel forwards in time to the George Washington Bridge on September 22, 1010. Am hypothesizing that my 1977 Anita Bryant time travel trip will mean that I will not see Tyler Clementi jumping off the George Washington bridge on September 22, 2010. If all goes according to Hoyle, on the evening of September 22, 1010 Mr. Clementi will instead be making beautiful music with his violin or having ice cream with his partner. These are the types of changes we shall enact with Florida’s time machines and wormholes. We are going to wipe out root causes of hate….one close minded moron at a time.

Thanks again for the hospitality and the snacks during last week’s whirlwind campaigning, Florida! Tell your friends to vote Mully and keep in mind that in this mid-term election we vote Mully early……. and we vote Mully often.

All My Best,

Mully

Campaign Rally Photos: October 6-10,2010

“Excuse me, have you seen a few hundred thousand people looking for the Mully for Emperor rally?”

“Down by Treasure Island? Look for the signs? Thanks”

“Hello and weclome to my rally. Would you like a jelly bean?”

“Nice to meet you, sir. f you are for jobs and against billionaires, please check the box marked ‘Mully’ on the ballot in the Emperor of Florida race. Oh, and please don’t vote for that Democratic loony tune Grayson. He is a nut job, but not the good type of nut. He’s the bad type.”

“So then, string theory adds the new microscopic layer of a vibrating loop to the previously known progression from atoms through protons, neutrons, electrons, and quarks. And BOOM, we have resolved the disconnect with quantum physics and general relativity. May I have another beer, please? Thank you.”

Rage Against The Man: Vote Mully on November 2

**Translation for the White Folks:

How are you doing? I figure two things. First, Rick Scott’s campaign is terrified of me because I am way more non-establishment than Rick Scott is. Second, there is no way those white bread xenophobes can read Spanish. In any event, here’s the gig. I may look like The Man; however, most days I rage against The Man by sitting in my office singing along to Take The Power Back by Rage Against the Machine. I support the Zapatistas in Mexico and am a big fan of allowing folks into America to work and make better lives for themselves. My Irish ancestors came here to work and make better lives for themselves. They built railroads and The Man wanted to keep them down as well. Am relatively certain that Latinos did not cause the bank meltdown or the poorly awarded mortgages to those who could not afford homes. Listening to The Man in the election, you’d think it was the Latinos who caused this downturn. In any event, am going to go back and speak with the white folks again.

(Editor’s Note: Monday at midnight begins the single week of live Florida campaigning. If you are unable to attend the midnight kick-off speech at Orlando Regional Airport, below is the speech in its entirety. Apologies to Dr. Seuss, his heirs, and his estate.)

On the far-away island of Pensa-co-la,
Mully the LaJollan was soon to be king of Florida.
A nice little state. It was clean. It was neat.
The water was warm. There were Cuban sandwiches to eat.
The Floridianites had everything Floridianites might need.
And they were all happy. Quite happy indeed.

They were… until Mully, the king of them all,
Decided the kingdom he ruled was too small.
“I’m ruler”, said Mully, “of all that I see.
But I don’t see enough. That’s the trouble with me.
With this stone for a throne, I look down on my state
But I cannot look down on the places beyond.
This throne that I sit on is too, too low down.
It ought to be higher!” he said with a frown.
“If I could sit high, how much greater I’d be!
What a king! I’d be ruler of all that I see!”

So Mully the (soon-to-be) Floridian King, lifted his hand
And Mully, the (soon-to-be) Floridian King, gave a command.
He ordered nine Floridianites to drive their pickup trucks to his trailer home
And, using these Floridianites, he built a new throne.
He made each Floridian stand on another one’s back
And he piled them all up in a nine-Floridian stack.
And then Mully climbed up. He sat down on the pile.
What a wonderful view! He could see ‘most a mile!

“All mine!” Mully cried. “Oh, the things I now rule!
I’m the king of a cow! And I’m the king of a mule!
I’m the king of a bunch of keys! And, what’s more, beyond that
I’m the king of an Everglade swamp and a cat!
I’m Mully the Floridian! Oh, marvelous me!
For I am the ruler of all that I see!”

And all through the morning, he sat up there high
Saying over and over, “A great king am I!”
Until ‘long about noon. Then he heard a faint sigh.
“What’s that?” snapped the King,and he looked down the stack.
And he saw, at the bottom, a Floridian named Mack.
Just a part of his throne. And this plain little Floridian
Looked up and he said, “Beg your pardon, King Mully.
I’ve pains in my back and my shoulders and knees.
How long must we stand here, Your Majesty, please?”

“SILENCE!” the King of the Floridianites barked back.
“I’m king, and you’re only a Floridian named Mack.”

“You stay in your place while I sit here and rule.
I’m the king of Urban Myer! And I’m the king of a mule!
I’m the king of a crocodile! And a manatee! And a cat!
But that isn’t all. I’ll do better than that!
My throne shall be higher!” his royal voice thundered,
“So pile up more Floridianites! I want ’bout two hundred!”

“Floridianites! More Floridianites!” he bellowed and brayed.
And the Floridianites ‘way down in the state were afraid.
They trembled. They shook. But they came. They obeyed.
From all over the state, they came swimming by dozens.
Whole families of Floridianites, with uncles and cousins.
And all of them stepped on the head of poor Mack.
One after another, they climbed up the stack.

Then Mully the Floridian was perched up so high,
He could see forty miles from his throne in the sky!
“Hooray!” shouted Mully. “I’m the king of the trees!
I’m king of the birds! And I’m king of the bees!
I’m king of the conch shells! King of the your rear!
Ah, me! What a throne! What a wonderful Pilsner beer!
I’m Mully the Floridian! Oh, marvelous me!
For I am the ruler of all that I see!”

Then again, from below, in the great heavy stack,
Came a groan from that plain little Floridian named Mack.
“Your Mulliness, please… I don’t like to complain,
But down here below, we are feeling great pain.
I know, up on top you are seeing great sights,
But down here at the bottom we, too, should have rights.
We Floridianites can’t stand it. Our backs will all crack!
Besides, we need food. We are starving!” groaned Mack.

“You hush up your mouth!” howled the mighty King Mully.
“You’ve no right to talk to the world’s highest Floridian.
I rule from the clouds! Over land! Over sea!
There’s nothing, no, NOTHING, that’s higher than me!”

Everybody knows that the world is full of stupid people
So meet me in Orlando at midnight
We’ll divvy up there
Everybody knows that the world is full of stupid people
Well I got the pistol
So I get the Pesos
That seems fair

But, while he was shouting, he saw with surprise
That the moon of the evening was starting to rise
Up over his head in the darkening skies.
“What’s THAT?” snorted Mully. “Say, what IS that thing
That dares to be higher than Mully the King?
I shall not allow it! I’ll go higher still!
I’ll build my throne higher! I can and I will!
I’ll call some more Floridianites. I’ll stack ‘em to heaven!
I need ’bout five thousand, six hundred and seven!”

But, as Mully, the Floridian King, lifted his hand
And started to order and give the command,
That plain little Floridian below in the stack,
That plain little Floridian whose name was just Mack,
Decided he’d taken enough. And he had.
And that plain little lad got a bit mad.
And that plain little Mack did a plain little thing.
He burped!
And his burp shook the throne of the king!

And Mully the Floridian, the king of the trees,
The king of the air and the birds and the bees,
The king of a house and a cow and a mule…
Well, that was the end of the Floridian King’s rule!
For Mully, the King of all Pensa-co-la,
Fell off his high throne and fell (PLUNK) by his double wide!

And today the great Mully, that Marvelous he,
Is King of the Mud. That is all he can see.
And the Floridianites, of course… all the Floridianites are free
As Floridianites and, maybe, all creatures should be.

As mentioned a week ago, the MofM campaign staff will continue to not mention that my opponent for Emperor of Florida, Rick Scott, perpetrated the largest Medicare fraud in United States history while CEO of Columbia HCA. Glass houses, cinder blocks and all that yadda yadda. If you are going to meet us at the gate for the October 4 campaign speech detailed above, look for this plane. We land at midnight.

If you see our campaign vehicle, feel free to stuff $100 bills under the windshield wipers. Game on, Rick Scott. Game on, Florida.